


And So I Dare to Hope

by unfolded73



Series: Fumbling Towards Ecstasy [3]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M, Pete's World
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-30
Updated: 2013-11-30
Packaged: 2018-01-03 02:11:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 20,557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1064480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unfolded73/pseuds/unfolded73
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rose and her Doctor start to adjust to their new life in the altverse. A spontaneous road trip through Wales brings them even closer together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Published summer of 2008. Britpicking by flyersun on LJ. What I said at the time: I should probably explain that for the purposes of this story, the quasi-canonical cut scene of Ten I giving Ten II a piece of TARDIS coral before leaving them on Bad Wolf Bay didn't happen. I'm not against it, necessarily, although I am having a hard time wrapping my brain around (1) the Who-skience of how he would turn it into a fully-functioning TARDIS in one lifetime, and (2) how a mortal, one-death-and-you're-dead Ten II could live a time-and-space travelling lifestyle. Most importantly, though, I want to explore where the relationship goes when they really are stuck with each other on Earth, living a life, day after day.

Rose awoke to the soft drone of snoring. She rolled over to look at him, sprawled across the other side of the bed on his stomach. His face was pressed into the pillow, his mouth hanging slack. It felt like a luxury to observe him asleep, something that she had never seen from the other version of him, and Rose took advantage of the opportunity. She tucked an arm under her head, watching his bare back rising and falling slowly with each breath.

The Doctor was still trying to work out his rhythms of sleep and wakefulness. He seemed to need about three to four hours of sleep a night to feel rested; much less than a human but considerably more than his Time Lord self had ever needed. Rose preferred to get at least seven good hours, and after a week together they had yet to settle into anything resembling a regular pattern. Most nights they had gone to bed together, and after making love he had tried to fall asleep along with her. When successful, he woke up bright-eyed at three in the morning. A few times he had given up on falling asleep and left her, which meant she found him asleep on the sofa the following morning, his long legs hanging over the edge of one of the arms.

Last night she had gone to bed alone, leaving him reading in an overstuffed chair. At some point in the wee hours of the morning he had stolen into bed, snuggling up against her back, his hand slipping under her nightshirt to lie flat against her stomach. For several minutes Rose had lain there quietly, trying to fall back to sleep and not respond to the feeling of his skin pressed against hers. In the end it had been fruitless to try to resist, as he began to trace gentle circles into her belly and his lips found a spot behind her ear. With a sigh she had turned into his embrace, already aching with need for him. It had been drowsy sex, slow and wonderful, and she had fallen asleep again as soon as it was over. 

Rose rolled out of bed, picking up her nightshirt and knickers from the floor where she had hastily discarded them and throwing them towards the hamper. She shuffled into the bathroom, yawning, and turned on the shower. As enjoyable as being awoken in the middle of the night for sex might’ve been, they couldn’t make a habit of it, not once she returned to work full time. Perhaps she should invest in a larger flat, she thought as the hot water ran over her hair, so that he could have a workshop all his own to tinker in during the early morning hours. Or they could even buy a proper house, she thought, chuckling to herself, with doors and carpets. She wondered if the Doctor would be as disturbed by the idea of a mortgage as he had been once, sitting under a black hole.

As always, the thought of the original Doctor set up a gnawing anxiety in her stomach. A slip of the tongue by her Doctor a few days ago had led to his reluctant confession that Donna was almost certainly not with the other him any more. The Time Lord consciousness would kill her, and the most likely outcome was that the other Doctor had removed Donna’s memories; everything about the TARDIS and the Doctor would have to be forgotten. Which meant that he was completely alone. Worse, he had probably already known what was going to happen with Donna even as he dropped them off on Bad Wolf Bay. 

The thing was, Rose had to admit, she was happy with her Doctor. She found herself to be completely head over heels in love with him, perhaps even more than she had been all those years ago. When he smiled at her or kissed her or whispered that he loved her, it made her heart hammer in her chest and her skin flush. When she thought about their future together, she felt so unbelievably fortunate. Then something would bring to mind the other him and the guilt and anxiety would slam into her, bringing her up short. The situation she was in would be quite laughable if it weren’t so damn sad.

When Rose was almost finished with her shower and was rinsing the last of the conditioner out of her hair, she heard the bathroom door open and then the unmistakable sound of a man urinating in the toilet.

“Rose,” came the Doctor’s voice, “what do you fancy for breakfast?”

Rose sighed, resting her head against the tile. _Definitely a bigger flat_ , she thought.

 

***

 

Rose opened the door to find her mother standing on the threshold. “Mum? What are you doing here?”

“Ooh, what a way to greet your mother when I came all the way into the city to visit my only daughter,” Jackie said, pushing into the flat and dropping some shopping bags by the door.

“You came into the city to shop,” Rose said, looking at the packages.

“Well, I did some shopping, but darling, I’m mainly here to see you.” Jackie looked around. “Where’s himself then?”

“He went with Jake over to Torchwood; I think they were going to rummage through the archives to see if the Doctor could identify any useful alien tech. They’ll be back by tea, I think.”

“Ooh, tea, you fancy a cup? I could murder one. You put on the kettle, I’m going to pop to your loo.” Jackie hurried from the room.

Shaking her head, Rose headed toward the kitchen. She was a bit relieved to see her mother, if she was honest. Being alone, her thoughts tended to turn toward the maudlin, and Jackie was a welcome distraction. Rose filled the kettle and set it on the burner, lighting the fire underneath with a twist of the knob. She watched the flickering blue flames, thinking suddenly of the kitchen on board the TARDIS. Was he having tea right now, she wondered? Rose imagined him leaning against the counter as he often did, one hand in his pocket as the other held his mug.

The sound of Jackie clearing her throat caught Rose’s attention. She turned and regarded her mother, noticing that Jackie had one carefully-plucked eyebrow raised. “Well, you didn’t waste any time, did you?”

“What are you talking about?” Rose asked as she pulled the canister of tea down from the cupboard.

“I couldn’t help noticing as I passed by that the guest room is spotless and unlived-in and your bedroom looks like a Doctor bomb went off in it,” Jackie said, sitting at the table.

“It does not, and also, my bedroom door was closed.”

“Condom wrappers on the floor, I mean really, Rose.”

“Mum!” Rose blushed, then waved her hand and turned her back. “Whatever, it’s your own fault for snooping.”

“I thought you said you were taking things slow.”

“I was. We were … the first night.” Rose got the milk out of the refrigerator, avoiding her mother’s gaze. “Then things sort of sped up.”

“Hmm. Well, I’m not surprised, really, given how long you were separated and him being part human now. I just hope you know what you’re doing.”

“I don’t think either of us really knows what we’re doing, it’s sort of a bizarre situation that we find ourselves in. We’re just doing the best we can.” Rose handed her mother a cup of tea.

“You know, you may not remember this,” Jackie said sarcastically, “but I’ve actually been in this situation myself, being with a man who was sort of the same man that I had been in love with long ago and sort of not. I may have some useful motherly advice for you on the subject.”

“As I recall, you ended up pregnant almost immediately,” Rose said, smirking at her mother. “Perhaps you could have done with a few condom wrappers on the floor of _your_ bedroom.” Jackie sniffed and didn’t respond to Rose’s jibe. Rose joined her mother at the kitchen table. “You’re right though, I probably do need advice. There’s a lot about this that’s confusing.”

Jackie reached out and took her daughter’s hand. “I’m here for you, sweetheart.”

“I mean, for one thing, he isn’t exactly the same. He’s the same in all the most important ways. He’s just as brilliant as the other Doctor. He’s got the same basic personality, the same sense of humour. He has the same memories of everything that we did together, and of every day that he missed me after I got trapped here.”

“See, you’ve already got it easier than I did. Pete didn’t have any of those memories. He had different ones of this other me.”

“But this version of the Doctor is different in a lot of ways, too. And I’m not complaining about some of them; the other one never could say ‘I love you,’ and we never … you know. Slept together. This Doctor is warm and wonderful and I love him. But I can’t help feeling that he’s somehow less. One heart. He’s growing old, just like me. He’s not alien any more, and his alienness is part of what I loved about him.”

“He’s still a bit alien,” Jackie replied, blowing over her mug. “Still talks like an alien.”

“Yeah, I know. Although he talks a bit like Donna, too.”

“What do you mean?”

Rose grimaced. “I think he was trying not to at first, trying to be exactly the same Doctor for me. But he’s gotten more comfortable with me the last couple of days and it’s started to slip out more. That process that created him, that … metacrisis thing, he ended up with some of Donna’s characteristics; mostly, some of her speech patterns. Sometimes, like when he’s angry or anxious about something, I notice it.”

“Well, that’s not really a big deal, is it?”

Rose shook her head. “No, it’s fine, I don’t care that much. It’s kind of cute, really. It just reminds me that he’s not the same, which reminds me that the other Doctor is out there. I worry about him all the time, Mum.”

“Well, if you ask me, I say he made his choice. The man isn’t happy unless he’s miserable, that’s what I think. He fears being alone, so he makes sure that he _is_ alone. You got the better end of the deal, sweetheart.”

“Mum, don’t say that. It’s not fair. I still love him, I can’t not.”

“Darling, as time goes on, this Doctor of yours is going to be less and less the same as the other one, because what are people except their experiences? Being part human is going to change him. Being stuck on Earth is going to change him. Being with you, especially if you get married, have kids … ” Jackie paused. “I assume you can have kids?”

“We don’t know yet, we’re going to look into it. For now, you know, better safe than sorry,” Rose said. 

“Would you want to?”

“I don’t know, Mum, one thing at a time. Maybe, someday, but we haven’t talked about it.”

“The pair of you’d make beautiful children, Rose.”

“Shut up.”

“Anyway, someday you’re going to find yourself looking at this man across the breakfast table from you and realize that he’s as different from the other Doctor as can be. And that’ll be okay, because it’s the one across the breakfast table who is growing old with you, and the other one will be just a distant memory.”

Rose shrugged, feeling familiar tears welling behind her eyes. “He just left us here, Mum. And I hate him and pity him and part of me still wants him.”

Jackie smiled at her with sympathy. “You just need time, sweetheart.”


	2. And So I Dare to Babble

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A deleted scene from And So I Dare to Hope written as a Support Stacie bidding incentive ficlet a year after the original fic was posted. Inserted where it follows in the chronology here.

The Doctor and Jake returned to Rose’s flat on time, which was moderately unexpected, knowing the Doctor. What _was_ expected, Rose thought as she watched them come in, was the large box of gadgetry the Doctor was laden down with after his first trip to peruse the Torchwood archives. He bounded in and plunked the box onto the coffee table, grinning at her. “You wouldn’t believe the things I found, Rose.”

“We were about to order a curry,” Jackie said, waving a take-out menu about. “Care to join us, Jake sweetheart?”

“Nah, got plans,” he said, winking at Rose. She wasn’t sure if his wink was because his plans were with the hot bike messenger he’d been seeing of late or if he was having a laugh at the idea spending more time with the Doctor than he already had. “See you back at work soon, Rose?” 

“Yeah, Monday,” she confirmed, and he made his exit with a vague wave at the room at large.

The Doctor was frowning at the take-out menu in Jackie’s hand. “Staying for dinner, then?” he asked in what Rose assumed he thought was a neutral voice.

Jackie bristled. “Is that a problem? I was just spending some quality time with _my daughter_ ,” she replied, leaving unspoken any accusations that he had been monopolising Rose’s time. Well, of course he had been. They’d been reunited after years apart, and they had this newly intimate relationship to figure out. It was like a honeymoon and a brand new romance all rolled into one, and that didn’t even touch on the complications added by the metacrisis. 

All of which Jackie had been sympathetic to a moment ago, as Rose confided her feelings over tea, but now faced with the alien her daughter was sleeping with, Jackie seemed to be reverting to protective mother mode.

“No, not a problem,” the Doctor said quickly, turning back to his box of treasures. “Ooh, take this for example,” he lectured to no one in particular. “You might think it’s just a Drivelian tetradrofluxius capacitor.”

“I might?” Rose chuckled, while Jackie excused herself to the kitchen to order the food.

“You might, but it isn’t. It’s actually a Marvelian octadrogladius capacitor. Easy to mistake; takes someone as brilliant as I to tell the difference.”

Rose smiled at his enthusiasm, not really caring what the device in question was. She walked over close to him, leaning up to kiss his cheek. “Missed you this afternoon,” she murmured.

His gaze settled on her, and Rose wondered with a lurch of her heart if she’d ever get used to him looking at her like that. “Missed you too.” His voice was pitched low, the way he talked to her in more intimate moments, and Rose thought she might swoon. “I also found a sonic interferometer!” he shouted suddenly, the sexy mood gone as quickly as it had come. He reached into the box and pulled something out. “Can’t build my new sonic screwdriver without this!”

The Doctor’s zeal was infectious, and Rose laughed with the sheer joy of seeing him happy. She looked up and saw Jackie frowning at the two of them, probably thinking them both daft. How to communicate to her mother that this was exactly the way the Doctor _should_ be, distractable and manic and babbling. It was this, more than anything, that reminded her how much the same man he was, and how much she’d always loved him, every version of him. 

And so she told him so. “I love you,” Rose said, interrupting his ramble.

The Doctor’s smile lit up his whole face. “I love you, too. Oh, and! Did I show you _this_? A bifurcated neutrino energy converter!”


	3. Chapter 3

The Doctor’s official title at Torchwood was Technology Consultant. On paper he reported directly to Pete, to whom he made it clear at the outset that he wasn’t going to be sitting at a desk pushing papers around. The upshot was that the Doctor could come and go as he pleased, and Pete gave him a large lab all his own and full access to the archives. He even got his own Torchwood car, although often as not he rode with Rose. He seemed, Rose had to admit, fairly content, although occasionally she caught him with a distant look in his eye, one she could only describe as longing.

“We need to go on a proper date,” the Doctor said as Rose drove them back to the flat from Torchwood one evening a few weeks later.

“We what?”

“A proper date. You and me. This is me asking you on a date.” Rose glanced at him long enough to see his silly grin.

“Doctor, we live together, we work together, we share a bed. We’re sort of past the dating phase of this relationship.”

“Aww, but we never really had a dating phase!” he whined.

Rose smiled, keeping her eyes on the road. “Sure we did. We went for chips after you took me to watch my planet burn. If that’s not dinner and a show, I don’t know what is.”

He made a pleased noise. “I haven’t forgotten our first date, course I haven’t. But I think there should be more dating. This weekend, Rose Tyler, we are going to go out, and I am going to pay, for I have money now. And a credit card! Me!”

Rose giggled. “Fine. I’ll go on a date with you.”

“Wizard.”

“You’re a nutter.”

“I’ll have you know, this is important,” he said airily. “I’m courting you, you know.”

“You’re doing it a bit backwards,” Rose said, slowing down for a red light. “Usually the courting comes before the sex.”

“Is it my fault that you were so easy?” he joked.

Rose gasped loudly, turning to stare at him in shock. She punched him in the arm. “I can’t believe you just said that!” She wasn’t angry, but she was surprised; it wasn’t like him to make that kind of a crack. _Must be Donna_ , she thought. 

The Doctor looked sheepish. “Sorry. That was … I don’t know where that came from.”

Rose couldn’t help but laugh. “I didn’t spend all that time crossing universes trying to get back to you just to hold your hand again, you know.” The light turned green and she hit the gas. “I had been formulating naughty plans for you for years, I wasn’t gonna let some Time Lord-human metacrisis and getting dumped back in this universe derail them.”

“Right, no.” He was looking out the window, his face turned from her. “And I’m close enough to the real thing, I suppose.”

“Wait, what? That’s not what I meant. You _are_ the real thing. Doctor—”

“No, you’re right. Ignore me, I’m saying all kinds of things I don’t mean today. Sorry.”

They drove the next few blocks in silence. “I’ll be looking forward to this date,” Rose said in a small voice.

He turned and smiled a smile at her that didn’t meet his eyes. “Me too.”

 

*** 

 

He told her to dress up, so Rose pulled out a never-worn burgundy cocktail dress that her mother had bought for her and slipped it on. High-heeled sandals came out of the dark recesses of her closet; she wondered if she even remembered how to walk in shoes like these. The Doctor had gotten dressed early and stepped out of the flat, calling out that he’d return in half an hour. Rose went into the bathroom to put on her makeup, wondering what he was up to. It was a relief to have the bathroom to herself, at least. The man spent more time on his hair than she ever had.

Just as she was putting the finishing touches on her lipstick there was a knock at the door. Rose frowned, trotting out of the bathroom and throwing her lipstick into a small handbag. “Did you forget your key?” she asked as she opened the door.

He stood on the threshold in his blue suit and a new tie, a bunch of daisies thrust out in front of him. 

“Ah,” Rose said, laughing. “This is part of your dating plan, I take it.”

“Yup,” he said as she took the flowers. “Pick you up, bring you flowers, take you out for a nice dinner.” He thrust his hands in his pockets, following her into the kitchen where she rummaged for a vase. “Hope you like daisies; roses seemed a little on the nose.”

“Mm,” she replied, filling a vase and plunking the flowers into it. 

“You look stunningly beautiful,” he said quietly, taking in her dress.

Rose closed the distance between them and planted a brief kiss on his lips. “Thank you. You’re very sweet.”

He held out his elbow to her. “Shall we? I was going to suggest we walk to the restaurant; it isn’t far, but you seem to be wearing impractical footwear.”

“I can walk, impractical footwear or no. It’s a nice night.”

“I hope so.”

The restaurant he had chosen was dark and intimate, and Rose could tell immediately that she was going to like it. It was old and not the least bit trendy, and appeared to owe its success to loyal patrons and quality food rather than faddishness. 

“How did you find this place?” she asked once they were seated.

“Believe it or not, I’ve been here before. Well, not _here_ here, but this restaurant exists in London in the other universe. It was with Martha, actually. We were stuck in 1969 once for rather a long time, and I brought her here to make up for something dreadful I’d done. Burned down the kitchen, I think it was.” He pulled his new glasses out of his jacket pocket and put them on so he could study the menu. They were, Rose had been relieved and a little turned on to see, the same as his old ones.

“What kitchen? On the TARDIS?”

“No, we’d gotten separated from the TARDIS. We had to get a flat while I sorted out how to get it back.”

“Oh, she was your flatmate? No wonder you had to make something up to her,” Rose teased.

“Oi! Are you saying you don’t like living with me?”

“There are many things that I love about living with you. Most of which probably didn’t apply in Martha’s case.” Rose’s eyes grew wide. “Or did they?”

“What?” It took a moment for her meaning to hit him. “No! No, of course not. What is it you don’t love about living with me?”

Rose sighed. “I just think we could use more room; you need more space to ramble around in when you’re awake at three in the morning. And a second bathroom. We definitely need a second bathroom.”

The Doctor eyed her suspiciously, then shrugged, looking back at his menu. “All right, fair enough.”

“I thought maybe we could buy a place. A bigger flat, or … or a house or something,” she said carefully.

“Sure we could. Capital idea,” he said without looking up.

“Is it?”

He met her eyes. “Of course. Like you said, more space.”

“There won’t ever be enough, will there?”

“Rose,” he warned.

“This time you’re separated from the TARDIS for good,” Rose said. “There’s no getting it back.”

“I have you,” he whispered fiercely. “And if I had to choose, I’d choose you every time.”

The waiter came up to their table at that point, interrupting the conversation, for which Rose was grateful. She glanced over the menu quickly while the Doctor had a protracted discussion with the waiter about several of the wines on the wine list. Eventually, their orders were placed and they were left alone again. Rose cleared her throat, trying to think of something to say.

“So,” the Doctor said too loudly, “Jake tells me you’ve met this universe’s Harriet Jones.” He took off his glasses and put them away.

Rose nodded. “Twice. We’ve had a couple of alien encounter issues that required Torchwood to interface with the President. Given my experiences, Dad thought I was the best one to meet with her.”

The Doctor was positively beaming at her. “I’m so proud of you.”

“Stop it,” Rose said, blushing under his scrutiny.

“I am! Not that I’m surprised; I always knew how fantastic you were.”

“I was just a shop girl before I met you.”

“You were never just a shop girl, Rose.”

The rest of the leisurely dinner passed happily as they traded stories about their time apart. The Doctor told Rose the whole story of the Weeping Angels and 1969, and she collapsed in giggles at the thought of his DVD easter egg. She also heard about Shakespeare and Agatha Christie and tiny aliens made of fat. Rose noticed that he was sticking to mostly light-hearted stories, and knew that there was probably much more about that time that he wasn’t telling her. 

As promised, the Doctor paid for the meal with his new credit card. “Well, as a diet plan, it sort of worked,” he was saying as he held the door to the restaurant open for her.

“Yeah, except for the whole dying part,” she said. They walked slowly down the darkened street.

“Granted, that was a problem. But the people who hadn’t melted entirely into fat seemed quite pleased with the results.”

Rose laughed, stumbling slightly on her heels and falling against him. The Doctor wrapped his arms around her and caught her. “Got you.”

“Thanks,” she said. “High heels and wine, a dangerous combination.”

They walked for a bit in silence, crossing back over into the residential neighbourhood, their fingers threaded together. The Doctor stopped suddenly, looking at a wrought iron gate. “What’s this?” he asked, putting a hand on the bars.

“It’s a private garden,” she replied, “owned and maintained by the people that live in these buildings.”

“Ah. Well, seems to me to be the perfect opportunity to give this its maiden voyage.” Reaching into his pocket, the Doctor pulled out a sonic screwdriver.

Rose clapped with excitement. “You finished it!”

“This afternoon,” he said as the lock clicked open. “Turns out those Torchwood archives are full of useful things.”

“I bet,” she said, following him into the dark garden and pulling the gate shut. Her heart hammered in her chest. “I’ve missed trespassing with you,” she whispered. They crept over to a large willow tree and sat down together on the grass underneath it. Rose pulled her sandals off, wiggling her toes in the cool grass. “Thanks for taking me to dinner, it was lovely.”

“You’re welcome,” he said, leaning over and kissing her. Rose closed her eyes and opened her mouth against his, revelling in his soft, wet lips. His hand came up and cupped her cheek and Rose threaded her fingers into his hair. They stayed that way for a long time, just enjoying the play of each other’s mouths.

He was the one to finally break the kiss, breathing heavily and looking into her eyes. “I still haven’t gotten used to this,” he murmured.

“What?”

“The way you make my body respond. It’s very human and quite overwhelming.”

“It wouldn’t have been like this with … uh, before?”

“I’m not saying it wouldn’t have been nice. More than nice. But I never felt like this. It’s that human sex drive, it’s amazing. No wonder you all are always so obsessed with sex.”

“I think you have to count yourself among our number when it comes to that,” Rose said with a giggle.

“Oh, indeed. If there is one thing I am obsessed with,” he said, running his hand down from her cheek to her neck and then over her breast, “it’s sex with Rose Marion Tyler.”

Rose smiled and climbed onto his lap, her dress pooling around them. “That’s okay with me,” she said, capturing his lips again. Their kisses became more urgent, and Rose rocked back and forth, seeking friction against him. The Doctor groaned, grabbing her bum and pulling her closer so that his erection hit her just right. Rose threw her head back, hissing. “We should go home, or I’m going to shag you right here and now,” she said.

He chuckled low in his throat. “And that would be bad because …” As if in answer, a dog barked loudly from across the garden. They looked over and could make out the silhouette of a late-night dog walker.

Rose grinned and stood up, grabbing her shoes in one hand and the Doctor’s hand in the other. “Run,” she whispered.


	4. Chapter 4

As soon as the doors to the lift in Rose’s building closed, she clutched the Doctor’s lapels and pushed him against the wall. They kissed frantically, teeth scraping lips. Rose lifted a foot, her inner thigh brushing against his trousers, and the Doctor reached down and grabbed her leg, raising it higher and pulling her against him. His other hand was in her hair. 

The soft chime barely penetrated the desire that was fogging her brain. “Our floor,” she mumbled into his mouth, pulling away and backing through the doors. He followed her, his gaze half-lidded and smoky, and she couldn’t resist pulling him into another kiss there in the hallway. Gradually they made their way to the door of their flat, Rose fumbling in her handbag for the keys while the Doctor sucked on her neck. 

When she finally got the door open they both half-tumbled through it. Rose unceremoniously dropped her handbag and keys on the floor and pounced on the Doctor again, her momentum carrying them back against the closed door. He let go of a throaty moan as she kissed his jaw and neck and tugged at the knot in his tie. “Rose, I’m getting the sense that you might be interested in sexual intercourse.”

“Whatever gave you that idea?” she said. Grinning her sexiest grin at him, she turned and walked into the sitting room. Before she could get more than a few steps he was behind her, stopping her with strong hands that gripped her hips. Rose felt his hard length pressed against her bottom as his mouth descended on her neck. 

“I’m not sure,” he said between kisses, “if I’ve ever, ever wanted you more than I do right at this moment.” His hands came up and closed over her breasts. “You are so sexy, so perfect.”

Rose was feeling a little tipsy, adventurous and wild, and she decided that what she wanted more than anything was him inside her, fast and hard and _now_. Fortunately, she thought, she had started taking the pill, so they didn’t have to fumble around with condoms any more. Lifting each foot in turn, she reached down and pulled her shoes off, tossing them in the corner. She made sure that in the process her bottom bumped against him. She then reached up under her dress and pulled down her knickers, shimmying them down her legs and stepping out of them.

“Rose, what are you doing?” he asked, his voice equal parts curiosity and desire.

She turned to look at him. The Doctor was nothing if not an attentive lover, thorough and careful often very tender. Tender was definitely not what she wanted from him at the moment. Rose kissed him, hard and passionately, and then went to work on the fastening of his trousers. “I want you,” she said, looking up at him through her lashes, “to take me, right here, on the floor.”

“Oh.”

Reaching inside his pants, she circled his cock with her hand and stroked him, making him bite his lip. “I don’t care if you get your clothes off. I just want _this_ ,” she said, giving him a squeeze, “inside me, now.” With that, she dropped to her knees. “C’mere,” she said, pulling him down with her.

They kissed, and she could feel his cock bumping against the front of her dress. “You on top?” he asked.

Rose shook her head. With a smirk, she turned her back to him and dropped onto her hands and knees. “Like this,” she said, looking over her shoulder at him.

“Oh,” he said again, but she didn’t have to tell him twice. The Doctor ran his hands up her thighs, lifting her skirt as he did so. He gathered the folds of her dress around her waist, and then she felt his fingers exploring her, spreading her. Rose pushed backward with her hips against his hand, letting her head drop. “Ah, Rose, you’re so wet,” he said.

“Because of you.”

The Doctor’s hand moved to Rose’s hip and then she felt the head of his cock sliding back and forth near her entrance. He pushed into her slowly with a long exhale. A few slow thrusts in and out and he moaned through gritted teeth. “Oh god, this angle is … so good. You feel so good.”

“Harder,” she gasped, arching her back. Looking at him, she saw that his eyes were fixed on the site where their bodies were connected, where he was pounding into her over and over. Rose felt powerful, watching the way he was watching her. Letting her head drop again, the ends of her hair dragging on the floor, she reached down and fingered her clit. 

His voice was coming in escalating, desperate sounds and she felt his fingers dig almost painfully into her hips. She moved her hand in rhythm with his thrusts and felt her orgasm starting to approach, tension coiling inside her, making her legs tremble and her skin flush hot. The Doctor came with a shout loud enough to wake their neighbours, but Rose couldn’t care, and she came immediately afterwards, crying out with relief.

He was panting, trying not to lean on her and mostly succeeding. Dropping onto her elbows, Rose wondered if the carpet burn on her knees would be too obvious the next day. Fortunately for her, she made a habit of wearing slacks. “Sorry,” the Doctor gasped, pulling out of her. “I couldn’t … Were you able to get there?”

She giggled and sat back on her heels. “Oh yeah.”

“Good. That’s good.” He stood up awkwardly and uttered a high-pitched laugh. “I seem to have my trousers round my ankles.”

Rose turned and arranged herself on the floor, pulling her dress down primly around her knees. “You do look a bit naff,” she said, smirking at him.

“Thanks,” he said, collapsing onto the sofa and attacking his shoelaces. “It’s all your fault, you didn’t give me time to undress.”

“I was in a hurry.”

“Yes, I noticed that. I liked it,” he said and smiled at her in a sexy, sleepy way that made her stomach flip. He kicked his trousers the rest of the way off.

Rose stood and took his hand, pulling him up. “Come to bed with me.”

“Gladly.”

After using the loo and brushing her teeth, Rose took off her dress and bra and climbed into bed with the Doctor, who was also naked. She curled into his side, one leg over his, and sighed happily. Closing her eyes, she listened to the steady thump of his heart for several minutes. When she chanced a peek at him, it was to see him staring at the ceiling.

“You aren’t sleepy,” she said.

“Not really, but I don’t want to move, I’m too comfortable,” he said, squeezing her with the arm that was wrapped protectively around her shoulders. “Don’t worry about me, you sleep.”

“I’m sorry about what I said earlier, about the TARDIS.”

“You didn’t say anything that isn’t true.”

“I know, just … ” 

He sighed. “I do miss it. Sometimes I miss it a lot. You know that moment, right before you wake up, when your dreams are dissolving and you start to become aware of where you are? Sometimes, in that instant, I fancy that I can feel the hum of my ship. It’s so real, that thrumming, and then it’s a shock when it turns out to be a figment of my imagination.”

“I used to feel that way a little, right after I got trapped here. I had terrible insomnia, and I think it was partly because I missed the sound and feel of sleeping on the TARDIS.” She put a hand flat against his chest, where that single heart was beating. “I’m so sorry.”

He met her eyes. “I meant what I said. Having you makes it worth it. This is my one life now, and I’m so lucky to get to share it with you.”

She stretched up and kissed him gently. “I love you.” 

 

*** 

 

Rose awoke in the dark and stared blearily at the clock.

“You’ve only been asleep an hour,” he said.

The Doctor was in the same position as before, looking up at the ceiling. “What’ve you been thinking about all this time?” Rose asked.

“What haven’t I been thinking about?”

“I’m going to get a glass of water,” she said, swinging her legs out of bed and pulling on her dressing gown. “Do you want anything?”

“No.”

When she came back from the kitchen, he hadn’t moved. Rose dropped her dressing gown on the floor. She watched his impassive face as she got back under the covers, wondering what it was hiding.

“I think we should take a trip,” he said suddenly.

“Yeah?” She thought about it. “Well, let me talk to Dad. I’ve got to finish up a couple of projects, but in a few weeks, we could—”

“Let’s go somewhere tomorrow. Tomorrow’s Saturday; let’s just get in the car and drive somewhere.”

“Um … okay. Where?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. Let’s just get out of London.” There was a pleading look in his eyes.

“All right, we will.” She leaned over and kissed him and felt his hand come up and thread into her hair. With gentle pressure against the back of her skull he deepened the kiss, his other hand running down her back to her bottom and squeezing. She felt him hardening against her thigh, and she smiled against his mouth. “Again?’ she asked in a throaty voice.

“Is that okay?”

She nodded, giving him her answer by moulding her body against his and kissing him deeply. He rolled her onto her back, mouth drifting down to her neck and shoulder as his hand roamed restlessly over her body. “I need you,” he whispered. “I need you.” 

“You have me,” she whispered back, her fingers combing his hair. “Always.” Rose wondered if he was doing this only because he wanted her or if it was an escape for him from thoughts that he’d rather avoid. His hand slid between her legs and she brought her knees up, opening for him. He touched her until she was breathless and moving erratically against his fingers. Before she could reciprocate, the Doctor was on her, pushing inside. Rose wrapped her legs around him, letting him control the pace. He pressed his forehead to hers, quiet except for the soft sighs he breathed.

Rose’s mind kept flitting away from what they were doing, to a spaceship lost to them forever and a suddenly longed-for car trip out of London and two men, neither of whom could really be whole. Both of whom had to settle for something less than they deserved. She was vaguely surprised when she felt a tear slide down her temple.

She could tell he was getting close so she moaned and murmured encouragement in his ear even though her own release was still distant. He moved faster, and a handful of deep thrusts later she felt his orgasm hit him. He cried out softly, and Rose ran her hands up and down his back soothingly as he slowed to a stop.

When he recovered speech, the Doctor frowned at her. “You tricked me. I thought you were close.”

“Me too,” she lied, shrugging. “I lost it.”

“Do you want me to help you find it again?” he breathed, his lips ghosting over her face.

“No, I’m tired.” She kissed him on the nose. “Make it up to me next time.”

“Okay,” he agreed, rolling off of her and pulling the covers up over them both. “I love you.”

Rose watched him fall asleep, his face gradually relaxing, his breathing slowing to a regular rhythm. It was a long time before she finally closed her eyes.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What I said at the time: Forgive any inaccuracies; I haven't been to Tintern Abbey since 1999, and only have my memory and our old Cadw guidebook to go by.   
> Links: [Tintern Abbey (with pictures)](http://www.castlewales.com/tintern.html)  
> The full text of [Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey](http://www.bartleby.com/145/ww138.html) by William Wordsworth. This is obviously the source of the title of this fic.

“Ejaculate and shoot over a mile?” the Doctor muttered to himself. “Even if that were physically possible, why on Earth would you want to?” He shook his head and clicked the “Delete all Spam” button. He had recently amused himself by reading aloud the subject lines of his spam emails to Rose until she had shoved him aside and deleted the messages herself to shut him up. Could he help it if he found 21st century electronic communication to be quaint and rather adorable?

He went back to his inbox and saw that a new message from one of his Torchwood colleagues had just arrived. “DNA results,” said the subject header. The Doctor opened the message quickly. The body of the email was short: “Doc, Here’s the results of that DNA sample you gave me to run; definitely alien, although there’s a lot of human base pair sequence markers as well. Could be contaminated? Anyway, I’m attaching the raw data like you wanted. Let me know if you want me to rerun it. Miranda”.

 _Doc?_ He wrinkled his nose at the nickname, which despite his best efforts seemed to be sticking among the Torchwood staff. He opened the attachment, his eyes flicking back and forth over the results. The fact that the sample was part alien and part human was no surprise to him, given that it was from him. As he had threatened to Rose during that awkward moment in front of the condom display on their first grocery shopping trip, he had (pun intended) taken matters into his own hands in order to determine the state his fertility. A quick check under a microscope had proven that his sperm count was perfectly fine, but didn’t address whether he was genetically compatible enough with a human to impregnate one. Extracting the DNA in his own lab, he had handed off the resulting sample to one of Torchwood’s lab techs, claiming that it was a field sample and could be alien in origin.

He stared at the data for longer than necessary; it hadn’t taken him more than a few seconds to determine that the required human alleles were present. He should definitely be capable of reproducing with Rose. Problem was, he didn’t actually know what Rose’s feelings on that topic would be. She had only expressed an interest insofar as the necessity of using birth control went. Whether she might actually want a baby with him at some point, he had no idea. 

For him, fatherhood had been something very distant, buried under centuries of time and the scars of loss. Then there were those too-brief hours with Jenny, which stirred up an old ache inside him that he had thought was long put to rest. Now here it was again, a faint longing that he didn’t even know was there until presented with this cold, hard data of his own genetics. Here was an opportunity that his other self would never have. A chance to pass on a piece of himself to another generation. He might only have one short, human life, but here was a way to live on. More importantly, it was a chance to create something, create _life_ , with Rose. It was a powerful pull. He wondered if she shared it.

The Doctor shook his head. Perhaps he would wait until more time had gone by before he talked to her about it. Things were still so new and strange; they were still feeling their way around. It was way too soon to be thinking about children, when they hardly knew how to look after each other. 

He was startled out of his reverie by a trill from his pocket. He pulled the phone out and flipped it open. “Hello?”

“Are you finished packing? I’ve got the car downstairs,” said Rose.

“Yeah, just finished,” he said, clicking his laptop computer closed and slipping it into a bag which he shouldered. “I’ll meet you down there momentarily.”

Picking up his suitcase, the Doctor left the flat and got into the lift. He found Rose right in front of the building, chatting amiably with the doorman next to a bright blue convertible. 

She saw him and smiled. “Hi.”

“What’s this?” he said, gesturing to the car.

“One of Dad’s. I borrowed it and left my car at their house. Thought it might be more fun this way.”

“Sure,” he agreed, stowing his bags.

Rose waved goodbye to the doorman and joined him at the car. “You wanna drive?” she asked, holding up the keys.

He grinned, grabbing the keys with a flourish and kissing her.

Twenty minutes later he was manoeuvring the car onto the M4, heading west. It was a perfect summer day, warm and sunny. Rose had fallen asleep almost immediately, and he wondered if she had slept poorly the night before. He knew that she was concerned about him, about how he was adjusting to this life. He caught her sometimes, watching him, a worried look in her eye. He wasn’t entirely sure how justified the worry was. There were days when he felt like the luckiest man in the world, when being on the slow path with Rose Tyler seemed like exactly what he wanted. Other days, he stared at the four walls surrounding him and it felt like he had an itch under his skin that he would never be able to scratch. The Doctor pressed harder on the accelerator, watching the scenery flashing by. It was maddeningly slow, this pace of travel. 

Rose started awake two hours later as he was leaving the motorway. She peered at the road signs, now in two languages, and rubbed her eyes. “Please tell me you aren’t taking me to Cardiff again.”

“Nope, although Cardiff isn’t far. Have you ever been to Tintern Abbey?” 

She shook her head. “I’ve heard of it, I think. Isn’t it a poem or something?”

He beamed. “Very good, Rose Tyler, indeed it is. ‘Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey’ by William Wordsworth. Very romantic sort, Wordsworth, and very into nature, like most of the poets of his time.”

“And he existed in this universe as well?”

“From what I can tell, this universe split off from ours later than the romantic period. I haven’t found much different in this universe prior to, oh, 1879?”

Rose stared at him, wide-eyed. “1879? Are you saying …?”

“Yup. I think most of the differences in this universe are a direct result of there being no Doctor and no Rose Tyler at the Torchwood Estate in Scotland. If you read the history books, which I have been—”

“Yeah, I noticed. You’ve littered the flat with them,” Rose said good-naturedly.

He regarded her, one eyebrow arched. “As I was saying, if you read the history books, that’s clearly when things started going downhill fast for the monarchy. A few years and one relatively bloodless revolution later, and England had a president.”

“I wondered about that. So you’re saying that because we didn’t exist in this universe, Queen Victoria got a really good biting and became a full-blooded werewolf?”

“Something happened to her, that’s for sure, although the history books are vague. As soon as I get some time, I’m going to go the library at Oxford and read some of the primary source material on the subject. But I think yes, with no Sir Doctor and Dame Rose, things went quite differently for the British government.”

“Wow. We really changed history.”

“Yup.”

“So any history before that point is the same?” she asked.

“Well, unless it was something that I myself influenced. For example, I’ve been reading Shakespeare in this universe, and his sonnets that reference the mysterious dark lady? They don’t exist. And do you know why?”

Rose thought for a second, then her face lit up. “Because that was Martha?”

“Exactly! He quite fancied Martha, Shakespeare did. Well, and me,” he said, sniffing.

“Shakespeare fancied you,” Rose said.

“You don’t have to sound so sceptical, you know. Also, I haven’t been there yet, but I know at least one thing that will be different in the British Museum.”

“Oh, I’ve been to the British Museum in this universe. You’re right, there’s no Roman statue of me there.”

“More’s the pity. That was an excellent piece of craftsmanship.”

Rose snorted. “You are so full of yourself.”

“Anyway, the nice thing about it is that I can pretty much count on most of history prior to 1879 to have transpired pretty much the same way in this universe as the one we left.” 

A few minutes later they were pulling into a gravely car park and got out of the car. Towering over them were the ruins of the ancient abbey. He watched Rose as they walked closer, as she took it in for the first time. Even though it was only a skeleton of what it once was, he supposed that the majesty of it, nestled in the Welsh hills, would be quite overwhelming for someone who had never seen it. “It’s beautiful,” she said.

“Quite.”

“I bet you’ve been here in the past.”

“Once.” He didn’t elaborate. They paid their admission to the Cadw volunteer and ventured onto the grounds of the abbey.

“So when did they build this?” Rose asked.

“Well, the abbey was founded in 1131 but they didn’t start building the abbey church until the 13th century,” he narrated as they walked around what had been the church. “It was influenced by Westminster Abbey of course, which had been rebuilt a few decades prior.” They stood on the short-cropped grass in the south transept, looking through the empty window space onto the blue sky. 

After a while they separated, Rose choosing to follow the designated walking path, reading each of the placards that described the history and daily life of the abbey. The Doctor rambled around the cloisters, studying the walls with the eye of an archaeologist. This part of the ruin was the most tumbled down, as the walls had not been built to stand the test of time the way the church had been. He felt the fruitless pull of time, the yearning to go back, back to see these walls standing proudly again. 

The Doctor eventually sat down on the grass, looking off into the distance at the rolling, green hills of the Wye valley. Time was, he used to point and laugh at archaeologists. Now he was reduced to sifting the ruins of time for clues to the past just as they would. He suddenly wished that he had spent more time travelling in Earth’s history. There were so many times he’d never visited, and now they were lost to him forever. He only had books and ruins, like everyone else. The inaccuracies of written histories were either known to him already or they never would be known to him, he was beginning to realize. Perhaps this trip was a mistake, he thought. He had meant it as an escape, but all it was doing was highlighting the limitations of this new life. 

He didn’t hear Rose coming up from behind and so was startled when she plopped down next to him on the grass. “I love it here,” she said. “Thank you for bringing me. It’s absolutely gorgeous.”

“Was better six hundred years ago.”

Rose shrugged. “I’m sure it was, but it’s beautiful now. It might have fallen down a bit, but there’s something wonderful about the fact that it’s still here; even in this world of mobile phones and fast cars, this is still here, tucked away in the hills. It’s almost better, seeing it this way, in the context of my own time.”

He looked at her. “Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

The Doctor smiled. “I almost let myself forget.”

“What?”

“That the joy of travelling with you is seeing things anew through your eyes.”

She seemed to think about that. “So how does that Wordsworth poem go?”

“Well, it’s a bit long. Part of it goes:

_“And so I dare to hope,  
Though changed, no doubt, from what I was when first  
I came among these hills; when like a roe  
I bounded o'er the mountains, by the sides  
Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams,  
Wherever nature led: more like a man  
Flying from something that he dreads, than one  
Who sought the thing he loved.”_

“Sounds like someone I know,” she mused. Rose wrapped an arm around his waist and put her head on his shoulder. They sat in stillness together, enjoying the tranquil setting for a while. 

Finally, the Doctor stood up, and he found that suddenly he felt lighter and happier than he had in days. “Come on. I bet we can make it to Caerleon in half an hour. Ever been there, Rose? A real Roman amphitheatre, right here in south Wales. You’ll love it.”


	6. Chapter 6

They ate dinner at a rustic pub in Monmouth, spending the meal laughing over pints of ale and baskets of greasy fish and chips. Inquiries with the proprietor led them to a bed and breakfast directly on the banks of the Wye River, where they checked in just as the sun was setting. Their room was large and sumptuous, with French doors that led directly onto a meadow where one could walk down to the river. 

Rose flopped onto the bed and sighed with contentment. “I’m completely knackered. If I fall asleep within the next two minutes, don’t take it the wrong way.”

The Doctor paused in his inspection of the room to smile at her affectionately. “I won’t.”

“Today was loads of fun, though. What are we doing tomorrow?”

He shrugged. “Well, we should probably be getting back, shouldn’t we?”

“Nah. I told Dad we were taking a few days away, and not to expect us back until maybe Wednesday. Is that all right?”

“It’s brilliant,” he said. “I’ve got so many places I’d love to show you.”

“I can’t wait.”

He noticed that Rose was looking at him oddly. “What?’ he asked.

“How old are you?”

“Well, it depends on what you mean. In one sense, I’m 904. In another sense, I’m about six weeks old.”

Rose rolled her eyes. “And neither of those is what I meant. I mean, you’re ageing like a normal human now, right? So how old are you in human terms?”

He shrugged, stretching out next to her. “I don’t know.”

“Well, what does it say on your driver’s license?”

“I don’t know, Pete must’ve told them something, but I didn’t pay it any mind,” he said, pulling his wallet out of his pocket and flipping it open. He put on his glasses and looked at the document. “Oh. My. _God._ Thirty-five?” he said incredulously, then looked at Rose, who appeared to be suppressing a laugh. “I don’t look as old as that, do I?”

“Seems about right to me.”

“ _What?_ ” He jumped off the bed and bounded over to examine his face closely in the mirror, alternating with and without the glasses. “Thirty, maybe.”

“I don’t know,” Rose said, coming up behind him, “what about the wrinkles?”

“I do _not_ have wrinkles,” he replied, clearly affronted, as he turned his head from side to side.

“Oh, yeah? Smile a big smile for me.” He smiled, and Rose poked him next to one eye. “Those, my dear, are called crow’s feet. At least, that’s what they call them when women get them. Men seem to get away with them more easily.”

“That doesn’t prove anything,” he said, stretching the skin next to his eyes.

“Also, you’re farsighted. That’s another sign of age.”

“I thought you liked my glasses,” he pouted, still looking at himself in the mirror.

“I do like your glasses. You are incredibly sexy in your glasses. And, for that matter, out of your glasses,” she said, turning his face away from the mirror. “So don’t worry about it.”

“Don’t worry about it? How old are you?”

“Twenty-three, you know that,” she said.

“See? I’m way too old for you.”

Rose laughed. “You just said a moment ago that in one sense you’re 904. I don’t think ‘too old for me’ even begins to cover it.” She leaned up and kissed him. “I’ll just be your trophy wife.” As he watched, her eyes grew wide with alarm. “I mean …”

He forgot to continue fretting about his age. He let his face split into a grin, wrinkles around his eyes be damned. “Indeed, that’s exactly what you’ll be. ‘Who’s that blonde bombshell on the arm of that distinguished gentleman?’ people will ask. ‘Why that’s Rose Tyler, his trophy wife.’ I like it.”

Quite suddenly, Rose was kissing him, backing him toward the bed. The backs of his legs hit the mattress and he sat down suddenly with a whoosh of breath. Rose climbed onto his lap and resumed her very enthusiastic activities.

“What’s all this?” he asked faintly as she trailed wet kisses down his neck.

“Nothing, just … I love you, that’s all.”

“I thought you were tired.”

“Changed my mind,” she mumbled, pushing him down onto his back. “Is that a problem?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Good.” Rose reached down and stripped her top off over her head, then deftly unfastened her bra and removed it as well. Both ended up on the opposite side of the room. The Doctor brought his hands up to cup her breasts as she leaned down to kiss him, and he again thrilled at the fact that this incredible woman was his. She rotated her hips against him, and he couldn’t help the groan that escaped him.

“You’re going to have to move for us to have any hope of getting naked,” he said.

Rose sighed. “I suppose you’re right.” She rolled off of him and onto her back on the bed.

The Doctor sat up, quickly removing his shoes and socks. As he stood and took off the rest of his clothes, he watched Rose watching him. “Enjoying the show?” he asked.

“Yes,” she replied, biting one of her fingers.

Once he was naked, he went to work on the rest of Rose’s clothes and she lay there smiling, lifting her hips when needed but otherwise passive, her legs hanging off the edge of bed. “Have I mentioned lately,” he said, kneeling beside the bed and planting a kiss on the inside of one of her knees, “how lovely you are?”

“Have I mentioned that you make me self-conscious when you scrutinize me when I’m naked?” she said, looking up at the ceiling.

“Don’t be self-conscious.” He nudged her legs further apart. “You are,” he said, kissing his way up her thigh, “completely entrancing to me.”

“Mm.” Rose reached down and rested a hand on the top of his head. Grasping her hips, he pulled her toward him, and he could hear Rose’s soft pants of anticipation as he ran a hand delicately over the soft curls between her legs. The smell of her sex sent a bolt of desire through him, but he forced himself to go slow. The first dart of his tongue against her clit caused Rose to gasp, and he couldn’t but smile as he began to taste her more thoroughly. While his mouth was focused on finding that perfect rhythm between her legs, his hand stole up her body and closed over one of her breasts, rolling and fondling it between his fingers. Rose moved restlessly, moaning and clutching the bedcovers as he nudged her closer and closer to release. 

The Doctor sensed her orgasm approaching and he intensified the pressure on her clit with his tongue, but just as he did so he felt Rose pulling on his head. “Please,” she breathed, and he stopped what he was doing. “Fuck me, oh god, now.”

He climbed onto the bed as she scooted back to make room for him, and with no further hesitation he positioned himself between her legs and drove into her with one swift stroke. The feeling of her, so hot and wet all around him, was almost more than he could bear. He pulled out and thrust in again, and Rose threw her head back, lost in pleasure. “This what you wanted?” he gasped.

“Yes, god yes.”

The pace they set was fast, Rose urging him on with increasingly loud moans and hands that gripped his bum. When she came with a pained cry, he felt her fingernails dig in to his skin. He slowed down, drawing out the spasms of her pleasure until Rose relaxed underneath him. Increasing his pace again, he pushed deeply into her over and over until his own orgasm hit him. Waves of intense pleasure washed over him and light seemed to explode behind his eyes. Whether he cried out, he wasn’t sure. When the aftershocks ended, he let himself collapse against her, vaguely aware that she was stroking his back.

Rose sighed against his neck. “That was amazing.”

“Quite.” He pulled out of her and rolled away, awareness of their surroundings bleeding in around the edges of his post-coital contentment. They were still lying sideways on the completely made bed. “Shall we get under the covers then?"

Rose hummed in agreement. When they were settled between the sheets, she snuggled up against his side and was shortly asleep. The Doctor eventually followed her.

 

*** 

 

He awoke very early, before dawn had even begun to break. That itch, born of being stationary for too long, buzzed under his skin. Rose was curled up and facing away from him, her breathing even and peaceful. Leaning over and touching a gentle kiss to her hair, the Doctor got out of bed and pulled on his clothes. Turning the knob on one of the French doors slowly, he left the house.

The riverbank was a short walk, and he plopped down onto the dew-covered grass. His heart felt unaccountably heavy this morning, infused with a creeping melancholy. He felt churlish, letting any amount of depression overtake him when his situation was far from unbearable. But the fact was, his primary coping mechanism was lost to him. He used to use motion to solve his problems. Running had always been his failsafe escape from anything: from emotions he didn’t want to feel or conversations he didn’t want to have or truths he didn’t want to face. Having no way to run was terrifying. It wasn’t even that he had anything he particularly wanted to run from, it was just not having the option that made him antsy.

He had been sitting for the better part of an hour when he heard soft footsteps treading across the grass. He turned to see Rose coming toward him, bundled in a sweatshirt with sleep-dishevelled hair.

“I’m sorry, I disturbed your rest,” he said as she sunk down next to him on the grass.

She shook her head. “You didn’t. I just woke up, don’t know why. Thought I’d come find you, is that okay?”

“Always.” They sat and watched the sun rise over the river for several moments. “Rose, you’ve been … you’ve been really good through all of this. I know that things didn’t turn out the way you would’ve wanted, but you’ve been so kind, and I just wanted to—”

“Doctor, stop. Who says things didn’t turn out the way I would’ve wanted?”

“I just mean you didn’t get to stay with him on the TARDIS. You got … you know.” He shrugged.

“I got what?”

“Second prize.”

“Don’t you dare say that. Don’t you dare think of yourself that way.”

“Come on, Rose, let’s face it. I’m less than he is. There’s so much that I can’t do now.”

She took his hand. “I don’t care about that. And you aren’t less. You’re the Doctor.” 

He sighed. “I thought so. Now, I’m not so sure any more.”

“I am.” She reached up and cupped his cheek, turning his face toward hers. “You are the man that I used to travel with: the man that gaped at me in a 19th century dress in Cardiff, the man that I sat on the apple grass of New Earth with, the man that likes edible ball bearings and bananas. Isn’t that you?”

The Doctor shook his head. “That man travels through time and space in a wondrous machine. I have a bank account and live in a flat and have a wallet full of little cards that are supposed to tell someone who I am. Little cards with a pretend name on them. How long before I forget that it’s pretend? I’m turning into John Smith right before your eyes, Rose.”

“You aren’t.”

“You still imagine we’re the same. So did I, at first. But it’s not true. I’m a pale imitation of him now.”

“No. Maybe you aren’t the same, fine. Who’s to say you aren’t better?”

He laughed, a dark little smile touching his lips.

“I’m serious! Who is it that told me he loves me that day on the beach? Who is that goes to bed with me and holds me every night? You. Not him, you.” She smiled. “Who is it that wasn’t terrified last night when the word ‘wife’ slipped out of my mouth?”

He looked back and forth between her eyes. “Why would that terrify me?”

“Well, that proves it. You’re right, you aren’t him. Doctor, there will always be a part of me that will love him, that man who travels through space and time. But if I have ever been sure of anything, it’s this: you are the man that I want to spend my life with.” She leaned over and hugged him tightly, and he could only cling to her in return.


	7. Chapter 7

They walked back up to the house holding hands. After showering and getting dressed (“Hiking clothes,” the Doctor said, and made the rare move of pulling on a pair of jeans), they went down to the dining room to take breakfast with the other guests. Rose was relieved to see that the room was set up with a few small tables rather than one large one, which meant she wasn’t forced to make small talk with people. She found she just wasn’t in the mood to talk to anyone else. It still felt like a luxury, getting to focus her attention entirely on the Doctor and being the entire focus of his.

She’d had a sort of epiphany the night before. Rose had spent weeks swinging wildly between happiness and guilt, feeling like she was betraying the other Doctor. Then last night, when she had jokingly made reference to being married to him and he had easily taken it in stride, suddenly everything seemed clear. The commitment that her other Doctor could never have made, this Doctor made without effort. But more importantly, Rose was now certain that the original Doctor had known it, the day he left them on Bad Wolf Bay. He had known that the only thing holding him back from letting himself love her completely was his own fear: fear of watching her age, watching her die, losing her. Her Doctor didn’t share that fear, at least no more than anyone fears losing the person they love, and the original Doctor knew he wouldn’t. 

It was painful and high-handed and arrogant, making that decision for all of them. But she found she wasn’t really angry any more. He had given her the greatest gift he could possibly give her. He hadn’t left her because he didn’t love her. He had left her because he loved her too much. And because in the end, she thought, looking at her Doctor across the table, perhaps he knew what was meant to be.

“What are you thinking so hard about?” he asked around a mouthful of eggs.

“Just … I’m thinking that I’m happy today.”

He smiled at her a little wistfully

It was harder for him, she thought. He wasn’t just adjusting to what had happened on that beach, or to the facts of their relationship, he was in a sense adjusting to the nature of his own existence. She wished she could make him see that even without the amazing travel, even without all of time and space, their lives together would be extraordinary because of who they were. They could never be anything but extraordinary.

“I was wondering,” she said, trying to distract him from maudlin thoughts, “if this universe split off from ours because of the stuff with Queen Victoria, and Queen Victoria founded the Torchwood in the other universe because of us, then why is there a Torchwood Institute in this universe too?”

“You haven’t read the original Torchwood charter? Shame on you,” he said.

“Hey, I was a bit busy trying to get back to you, so cut me some slack. What does it say?”

“That Torchwood was founded in honour of those who died at Torchwood Manor in 1879, and to investigate, among other things, the presence of mysterious paranormal influences on the monarchy.”

“So Torchwood was going to exist regardless. Whether or not we stopped the werewolf and incurred the queen’s wrath.”

He nodded. “It was actually quite a relief to me when I realized that. I blamed myself.”

“For what?”

“For the lever room. For losing you.”

“That’s ridiculous. Blame the Daleks, blame the Cybermen. It wasn’t your fault.”

“I thought it was my fault that Torchwood existed in the first place. I tortured myself with that knowledge. Now I realize that it all might’ve happened the same way, even if we’d never been to 1879.”

Rose looked down at her plate. “I worried sometimes that you would forget about me. That you’d moved on, found someone else—”

“Never.” His voice rose above the din of the room on that word, and he glanced around with embarrassment. “I mean, yes, I travelled with other people. But I never forgot about you, not for one day.”

“I know that now,” she said, smiling shyly. “Or at least, I figured after the way that Martha reacted when she realized who I was.”

“What? How did she react?” He looked a bit terrified at the idea.

“Oh, of course, you weren’t there yet. When she heard my name, she said, sort of awestruck, ‘Oh my god, he found you.’” It made me realize that you’d talked about me, that I was still important to you.”

“Of course you were.” He grimaced. “I could’ve handled things better with Martha. I’m touched that she reacted that way, after everything that happened.”

“What, did she have a thing for you?” The Doctor pulled a face. “She _did_ ,” Rose said, smirking, “and you didn’t have the sense to be completely straight with her.” 

“I didn’t encourage her,” he protested.

“I’m sure you didn’t mean to, but you are _you_.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Well, perhaps I’m biased, but you have a certain inherent … sex appeal.”

He sniffed, preening. “Well, yeah, course I do.”

“And you flirt.”

“I do not _flirt_.”

“You do too.”

“I’ll have you know that Donna wasn’t the least bit interested in me that way.”

Rose laughed and sipped her tea. “I wasn’t saying that you put all women under your thrall, or that no one can resist the power of your sexy. I can just see how someone might fall for you and then be confused about your ambiguous behaviour is all.”

“ _Ambiguous behaviour_ ,” he scoffed, making Rose giggle all the more. 

After breakfast, they checked out and got back into the convertible. “Where are we off to?” Rose asked.

He just grinned enigmatically. “You’ll see.”

Rose tried to orient herself to where they were going, but the Doctor took them into the country via minor roads. They seemed to be going northwest, deeper into Wales, but beyond that she didn’t have a clue. She decided to sit back and enjoy the scenery. They were passing through rolling green hills dotted with sheep, and Rose was amused that she could make out the faint drone of their baas even over the hum of the car’s engine. The Doctor was taking the curves on the narrow road a little fast for her comfort, and she squealed as they careened past a car going in the opposite direction. With a waggle of his eyebrows, the Doctor grinned at her and shifted gears.

“You’re a bit mad, you realize that?” she asked.

“Just now figuring that out?”

Rose laughed and swayed as the car rounded another curve. “Well, I’ve certainly always known you were a rubbish driver.”

“Rubbish? Ooh, you’re going to pay for that comment, you are.”

As the morning wore on the landscape grew more mountainous. They stopped in the quaint village of Dolgellau for lunch, and then did some leisurely perusal of the shops. Rose at first thought that they were wandering aimlessly, but she soon realized that the Doctor had a plan. He bought a backpack and a camping blanket, and then led them into a small supermarket.

“And what are you up to, then?” Rose asked as he quickly threw items into his basket.

“Packing a picnic.” He threw her a cheeky grin. 

Before long they were back on the road. After another couple of hours of scenic mountain driving, the Doctor took them up a gravel road and stopped the car, seemingly randomly.

“What are we doing?” Rose asked.

“From here, we walk,” he pronounced, getting out of the car. While Rose joined him, he fetched his pack, now loaded with their picnic, from the trunk and shouldered it. He led them to a marked path with small, almost illegible signs that said ‘Druid’s Circle’ with a pointing arrow. 

As they ascended, the path became more difficult to make out, but every now and then another worn sign would reassure Rose that they were going somewhere. At one point, they had to stop so that a man could cross their path with a herd of sheep.

“Are you sure you haven’t figured out a way to take us back in time?” Rose asked as she watched the woolly bodies trundle past.

“Wool is still a big deal in Wales, even today. It has to come from somewhere.”

“I suppose. It’s weird though; I’ve spent my whole life in the UK. Well, you know, not this one, but the one in the other universe. But really, Mum could rarely afford to take us outside of London. We hardly ever went on holiday. A couple of trips to Brighton, and that was about the extent of it. Once, when I was sixteen, I spent a weekend in Blackpool that I’d just as soon forget,” she said with a shudder. They resumed walking. “Then, since I got trapped here, I was too busy to travel for fun, even though money was no longer an object.” She took the Doctor’s hand. “After travelling with you, I felt so worldly, like I’d been everywhere and seen everything. I’m starting to realize that I don’t even really know my country that well. There’s so much of Earth I haven’t seen.”

“Well, we’ll have to rectify that, I think.”

“We will!” She skipped a bit, excited by the thought. “We can go anywhere we want. South America, Cambodia, New Zealand … anywhere!”

“Anywhere on 21st century Earth,” he clarified.

“Yes, but there’s a lot to be said for 21st century Earth.”

The Doctor smiled. “I suppose that’s true.”

They continued their hike. At a couple of points it became almost a climb, as they had to struggle over rock ledges that interrupted the path. Finally, as the afternoon was waning, they emerged onto a flat, grassy piece of headland. In the centre of the space was a granite stone circle, about 100 feet in diameter. The stones were of varying sizes, most of them quite small and none taller than about waist-high. Rose approached it cautiously.

“How old is this?” she asked in a low voice.

The Doctor tugged on his earlobe. “About five thousand years, give or take.”

“Wow.”

“Stonehenge is all well and good – I assume you’ve been there?”

“Once, on a school trip,” Rose responded. “It was really crowded, and we couldn’t walk anywhere near the stones.” As she said this, she trailed a hand over one of the taller stones and stepped into the centre of the circle.

The Doctor tutted. “It really does need to be seen back in the day, before anyone put up ropes around it, and when it was all still standing. Still, even half fallen over, it’s quite magnificent as a feat of engineering. On that score, this doesn’t really compare. However, I always thought that smaller stone circles like this – and Britain is littered with them – were more evocative of the druids and what they were like. Ancient humans, trying to make sense of the natural world, doing relatively complex mathematics with only the most rudimentary theory to back it up. Amazing.” He continued to ramble on about maths and astronomy and druids and Rose smiled indulgently at him, happy to see him so excited about something. 

The view from their position was magnificent, out over the clear blue water of the Irish Sea. When the Doctor finished his lecture, he unpacked the blanket that he had bought and spread it out, then brought out the food: hearty lamb sandwiches, bags of crisps, and bananas followed by two bottles of beer. Rose joined him, sitting cross-legged on the blanket. They ate, watching the water and enjoying the warmth of the late afternoon.

“It’s a beautiful spot.”

“Pretty much the way I remembered it,” he said.

Rose put her head on his shoulder. “You and me, living and working and shopping and shagging and travelling. It’s gonna be fantastic, yeah?”

The Doctor planted a soft kiss on the top of her head. “Yeah.”


	8. Chapter 8

They walked back down in the dwindling light, reaching the car just before it became too dark to be safely hiking. The Doctor drove them to nearby Conwy, where they checked into a hotel for the night. Rose took a long hot shower and changed into some comfortable pyjamas. While the Doctor took his turn cleaning up in the en-suite, Rose crawled under the covers. The next thing she knew, he was joining her in bed. 

“Sorry, I thought I had just closed my eyes for a minute,” she said, rubbing her face.

The Doctor chuckled. “That’s fine, you don’t have to apologize for sleeping.” Rose rolled over and let him spoon against her back, his skin warm from the shower. She sighed with contentment. Lying there in the quiet, she felt more at ease with him than she thought she ever had up to this point. The Doctor’s hand was resting against her stomach, and Rose covered it with her own, threading their fingers together. 

“There’s something I’ve been meaning to talk to you about,” she said into the darkness.

“Hmm?”

“When I was working with the dimension cannon, after the walls between universes started breaking down and the stars started disappearing – you know how I told you that it could measure timelines, and that we soon discovered that they converged on Donna.”

She felt him tense up. “Yeah?”

“Well, I was trying to find out as much about her as I could, because I knew it might take me a while to hit the right universe. It was trial and error at first; I can’t tell you how many wrong universes I visited before I hit on the right one. Anyway, as a sort of research project, I had Torchwood track down the Donna Noble of this universe, just so I could learn as much as I could about her. Even though some of it was bound to be different, I figured every little piece of information might help. My point is, there _is_ a version of Donna in this universe.” 

He swallowed audibly, then paused a moment before he spoke. “I know.”

“You know? You checked already?” Rose let go of his hand and rolled over to look at him. She could just make out his features in the darkness.

He nodded, not meeting her eyes. “I checked the phone book a few days after we got here. Noble, same address as in our old universe.”

“And?” He seemed uncomfortable talking about it, but she was so curious, she couldn’t help but ask.

“And I rang the number,” he said. “Spoke to Wilfred. He said Donna was out.” The Doctor cleared his throat. “I didn’t leave a message.”

“Well, I’ve been thinking, maybe we should figure out a way to befriend her, you know, without freaking her out.”

He shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

“Why not?”

His sigh was heavy. “Because, I keep thinking about what the other Doctor almost certainly did, to save our Donna. Took her memories. Made it so that she couldn’t remember anything: not him, or the TARDIS, or anything we did together. It must’ve hurt like hell to take all of that away from her. And I don’t think, in light of that, that I can face a Donna who looks at me like a stranger.”

Rose put her hand over his heart. “OK, that will hurt, I get that. But wouldn’t it be worth it? To get another chance to be friends with her?”

“You have to understand, we met under some pretty unusual circumstances.”

“You don’t say,” Rose said, giggling.

He huffed. “I just mean, I’m not sure if under ordinary circumstances I could get her to give me the time of day.”

“I think you’re underestimating her.”

“I just don’t—”

“Besides, I think you need her.” She absently scraped her nails through the hair on his chest.

“Why?”

“I love you with all my heart.” Rose leaned up and kissed him gently. “But I can’t be everything to you. I shouldn’t be. And I get the feeling that she was a good friend.”

“She was. She was a great friend. The best.”

“Well, maybe she could be again.”

“Maybe. I’ll think about it, but I’m not promising anything.” His face was closed off; it was clearly something that he didn’t want to discuss further.

Rose decided to let it drop. “Okay.” She kissed him again and curled against his chest, closing her eyes.

 

*** 

 

The next morning they visited Conwy Castle, which Rose proclaimed to be so much like something out of a fairy tale, with its many round turrets, that it was almost disappointingly stereotypical.

“If you could see when it was inhabited, with human waste pouring into the moat, you wouldn’t say that,” he responded.

Rose laughed. “Fair point.”

They walked along the battlements, a cool wind tousling their hair, their fingers interlaced. He realized that he felt good. There was no other way to describe it, and he found it funny that he was struggling to define such a simple emotion. He felt _good_. He stopped walking, leaning against the stone wall and looking out at the town and the water below them. Rose matched his pose.

“Rose, there’s something … I found out something right before we left London.”

She looked a little alarmed. “What?”

“Nothing bad. Just, well. I got confirmation that you aren’t taking those birth control pills for nothing.”

“Oh. You mean…”

“I mean I’m genetically compatible with a human, as far as reproduction goes.”

“Well, it’s a good thing we’ve always been careful,” she said, looking off into the distance. 

“Right.” His heart sank. Perhaps that was the only aspect of this that interested her. Maybe Rose never had wanted children; she certainly had been willing to commit to travelling on the TARDIS forever, which was fairly incompatible with raising a family of any sort. 

Watching her face, he decided suddenly to just get the issue out in the open. “Do you think that someday, you might want to change your mind about being careful?”

The look she gave him was pure confusion. “What?”

He sighed heavily. “Do you think, if things between us … that is, if in a few years we’re still together, if you haven’t kicked me to the curb—”

“I’m not kicking you to the curb.”

“Okay, good, that’s reassuring. But do you think in a few years you might want to, er, try for a …”

Light dawned on her face. “Doctor, are you asking me if I want a baby?”

“Not now! You know, someday. Years off, certainly. After all, you’re only twenty-three, so it’s not, there’s no rush—”

She cut him off with a kiss. Her expression was difficult to read; mostly she looked surprised. “That’s really something you want?” she asked.

“I didn’t … I wouldn’t have thought so, at first. But the more I think about it…” He felt ashamed, watching her face for some clue at how to continue. “I do want it,” he admitted in a rush. “I want to create a life with you. I want to see you as a mother. I do want it.”

Rose smiled a heartbreakingly sweet smile, and reached up to touch his cheek. “I think maybe I want it too.”

He stared at her in shock for a moment. “Really?” he finally managed to choke out.

She giggled and flushed. “Really. Let’s have a baby. Not, you know, now. Like you said, someday.”

He hugged her, and then a feeling like his heart swelling inspired him to pick her up and swing her back and forth. They both laughed. He kissed her, and it was infused with so much joy that he thought he’d like this moment to never end.

“Mm,” Rose said, breaking the kiss as he set her back on her feet. “I’m suddenly wanting to practice this baby-making thing more. Just, you know,” she said, winking, “so that we’re sure we know what we’re doing when the time comes.”

“It is going to take years of practice. Very dedicated practice,” he said with mock seriousness. 

She grinned at him. “Is it too early to go back to the hotel?”

 

*** 

 

Rose straddled him, slowly rocking back and forth. He lay amongst the tousled sheets, looking up at her face, framed with golden hair. The midday sun filtered through curtains and lit her up. Her breasts bobbed slightly as she moved, and he focused on the perspiration that had sprung out on her skin. 

“What else?” she asked breathlessly. Her hands were resting gently on his chest.

The Doctor reached up and cupped one of her breasts. “Your breasts will be larger.”

She smirked. “Will you like that?”

“They’re perfect now. They’ll be perfect then, but for a different reason.” Her movements remained slow and shallow, blissfully pleasurable but not moving either of them much closer to release. 

He moved his hand down to her abdomen and brought his other hand around to join the first. “Right here. Life will grow inside you.” He couldn’t stop himself from smiling. “I’m imagining how sexy you’ll be.”

She sniffed. “Fat. Not sexy.”

He shook his head. “Very sexy. Carrying my child? _Unbelievably_ sexy. I probably won’t be able to keep my hands off you.” He ran his hands up and down her flat stomach, envisioning their future.

“I had a friend who was pregnant,” she said, then gasped when he thrust up into her with more force. “Said she was horny all the time during her second trimester.”

“Hormones cause all kinds of changes to your body. It can make you more sensitive here,” he said, brushing his fingers through the hair between her legs. “Make it even easier for you to come.”

“Not that … not that I have much trouble with you as it is,” she said as she sped up, lifting off of him and sinking back down. The increase in friction sent prickles of pleasure sparking through his body and out through his fingers and toes. He closed his eyes, continuing to touch her. “I love this,” she murmured. 

“Yes.”

“It’s almost too perfect,” she continued. “I do this because I love you, because it feels good, and it makes you feel good.” Her voice had taken on a desperate note as the physical pleasure ramped up another notch. Her rhythm never faltered. “But one day we’re going to do this to make a baby.”

“We are.” He was enraptured with her words, not just what she was saying, but the flow of her voice as she made love to him. He met her each time that she lowered herself onto him with a thrust of his hips. He felt his climax approaching and concentrated on not letting it overtake him.

“I love you,” she cried, and then leaned over so that she could grind onto him, all semblance of going slow now over. “Never stop .. oh god, never stop …”

“You’re mine, Rose, forever.” He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to hang on.

“Yes, love, _yes_ ,” she cried. He felt the flutter of her orgasm and he lifted his pelvis against hers a few more times and came, clenching his teeth so hard that it hurt his jaw.

Rose collapsed on top of him, her head pillowed on his chest. Her breathing gradually slowed. “That was nice,” she said after a few minutes.

“Nice? It was bloody well more than nice.”

She laughed and lifted up, letting him slip out of her, and then collapsed onto the bed. “I didn’t mean the sex, that was spectacular.” She curled up against him. “I meant talking about making a baby.”

He hummed with contentment and wrapped an arm around her. “Yeah.”

“I never thought … I mean, I used to have this vague sense that I would be a mother someday. I think it’s something that most girls just assume. But I never thought about it specifically with anyone. Never with Mickey. I just … couldn’t really imagine it. And never with you before. I didn’t even know if it was biologically possible, and—”

“Not impossible for a Time Lord and a human to have a baby, but not the natural way. Requires some technology to get those two genomes to combine properly.”

“Anyway, we weren’t even lovers, so my fantasies never went much beyond that first consummation,” she admitted.

“Oh? I think I need details of these fantasies, please,” he said, grinning at her.

“I think we’ve already fulfilled most of them,” she said. “As I was saying, this is sort of the first time I’ve thought about it this way. Having a baby _with_ someone, as a concrete thing in my future.”

“And?”

“And I like it,” she said, kissing his shoulder.


	9. Chapter 9

The next morning, Tuesday, Rose awoke feeling groggy but happy. There was no sign of the Doctor; as seemed to be his preference, he had gotten out of bed early and wandered out of the room. Dragging herself into the en-suite, Rose turned on the shower and stretched. She was pleasantly sore from the previous evening’s exertions, which had been less about hiking and more about rather mind-blowing sex. She grinned at her reflection in the mirror. It seemed almost beyond belief now, that she had spent so long living in close quarters with him on the TARDIS and they had never been physically intimate. 

When she got out of the shower, he was just returning to the room, juggling breakfast and barely succeeding at not spilling tea all over everything. They sat together and ate while the Doctor regaled her with tales of his morning’s rather mundane adventures. Rose couldn’t help staring at his hair as she bit into her croissant; its genuinely dishevelled state possibly sexier than the carefully crafted bed-hair look that he seemed to aspire to. She wondered idly what running her fingers through it might lead to, and if they had time for another round before checking out.

“So,” he said, oblivious to Rose’s train of thought, “back to London today, I suppose.”

“Yeah. It’s too bad. I was having such a good time.” She took a sip of her tea. “I think we should start planning a bigger trip, somewhere exotic.”

“Did I ever take you to Machu Picchu?” 

“No.” Rose shrugged. “We went to that planet, what was it called? It had those weird pyramids, and you said—”

“Alyarius! That was brilliant, and you’re right, it was reminiscent of ancient South America. Especially when they wanted to sacrifice us to their god of the harvest, remember that? Still, you’ll love Machu Picchu.” His face lit up with a wide, infectious grin.

“That’s settled, then. Let’s go to South America.”

By mid-morning, they were back on the road. It was overcast and threatening rain, so they put the roof of the convertible up.

“What are you grinning about?” he asked at one point after a long period of silence, and Rose flushed at being caught out.

“Last night,” she admitted.

He hummed contentedly at that. “My mind has been going over those events as well.”

“Were you attracted to me physically, before?” 

“Before?”

“You know. When we were together on the TARDIS.”

“Ah. When I was fully Time Lord.” He reached up and rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly. “That’s a complicated question.”

“Why is it complicated?”

“It’s different, as a Time Lord. The simple answer is, yes, I was attracted to you. I was in love with you, and of course finding you physically attractive is part of that. But I wasn’t … “ He paused and sighed, struggling for words. “You know how I said that I found this human sex drive somewhat overwhelming? It’s because there’s a lack of control to it that I’ve never experienced before. If I had chosen to, I could have felt this way with you before, sort of, but it would have been a conscious choice to drop that control.”

Rose frowned. “All that time? You were just restraining yourself?” She felt suddenly quite angry. “The way I felt about you, before _and_ after you regenerated … did you know?”

The Doctor cleared his throat. “Not … not all that time, no.”

“But you figured it out, yeah?” He said nothing, keeping his eyes on the road. “After what happened on New Earth, with Cassandra, you must’ve realized …”

“I realized you were attracted to me in this body,” he said.

“So why? Why didn’t you let yourself be with me? If you were in love with me then, if you could’ve wanted me the way you want me now, then why?” she demanded.

The Doctor made an incomprehensible noise of frustration. “It wasn’t that simple. I’m so old, Rose—”

“So?”

“Look, the choices I made then – you must know that those aren’t the choices I would make now. It’s like, they happened to me, they were my decisions, but I have a very different perspective on them, being the person I am now. I made mistakes, I realize that.”

“What you’re saying is, I shouldn’t hold this you responsible for the things you did when there was only one of you,” she said, crossing her arms over her chest.

“Only the good things,” he replied, winking.

Rose sighed, her anger dissolving. “It’s just, when I think of all that time, when we could’ve been …”

“What, shagging? Would that have made it easier, after you got lost? After we were separated?”

“Maybe. I don’t know.”

The rode in silence for a long time, and Rose watched the droplets of rain trailing down her window. 

“I tried to get back to you,” he said finally. “When I sent that projection, when we met in Norway, I had been trying to get back to you. There just wasn’t any way.” 

“Davros did us a favour.”

“Cosmic matchmaker, Davros.”

Rose laughed, the remainder of her frustration ebbing away. “I’m sorry. I don’t know why I’m fixating on the past. You and me, we’re about the future. I know that.”

“It’s fine. I don’t mind talking about it.” Rose arched an eyebrow, and she watched as he took in her scepticism. “OK, I mind, but I’ll talk about it if you need to.”

“Will you tell me about all the things that happened to you while I was away? With Martha and Donna and … was there anyone else?”

“Not on the TARDIS, no.” He sighed heavily. “Some of it won’t be easy for me to talk about.”

“I know. I just want to know what I missed.”

“Let’s just say there were times that I was glad you weren’t with me. That you didn’t have to endure some of it.” His eyes were far away.

“You don’t have to talk about it now,” she said, reaching out and covering one of his hands with hers. 

“I will someday, I promise. Give me time.”

Most of the rest of the trip passed in silence, or to the soothing drone of the Doctor talking about inconsequential things. Rose hoped that the deeper understanding that they had reached on their road trip wouldn’t be lost once they returned to London and to their lives of work and sleep and bill paying. Would occasional trips to exotic locations be enough to stem his wanderlust? Would having children together someday make him feel like this life was fulfilling? Only time would tell: the limited time of the single lifetime that they had together.

 

*** 

 

“What do you mean, a giant wasp?” she asked.

“Exactly what I said, a giant wasp. A wasp that was giant.” He pulled up in front of their building; it was late afternoon. 

“So you met Agatha Christie, and got mixed up in a murder mystery involving a giant wasp. That’s so _you_.” Rose waved to the doorman, who came over to help them with their bags. 

Later, Rose would say that there was no warning at all. Sometimes when something unexpected occurs, like dropping a glass, you have that moment before the crash when time slows down. In that moment you can see, with perfect clarity, what’s about to happen, but you are paralysed to stop it. That wasn’t the way it was. One moment, the Doctor was standing beside the car, gesturing madly and talking about wasps and amulets and the speed of automobiles from the 1920’s, and in the very next instant he was tumbling over the car that had hit him and crashing to the pavement.

Perhaps she screamed. Later she thought she must have screamed a lot, because her throat was raw, but she had no memory of it. She could remember running, she could remember dropping to the pavement while tires squealed from somewhere nearby. She could remember his leg bent at an awkward angle. He was unconscious, and she had listened for his heartbeat, and had she cried? Not then, but later, she had cried.

 

*** 

 

“He’s going to be fine.”

Unable to support herself on legs turned to jelly, Rose had plopped back into the hard plastic chair of the hospital waiting room.

“Tell us about his injuries.” It was her mum, talking to the doctor. His green scrubs clashed with the walls behind him, Rose thought incongruously.

“He’s got a compound fracture in one leg, and we’re repairing that now. A minor head injury, some internal bruising. It could have been much, much worse. He’s very lucky.”

 _Lucky_ , Rose thought. Her whole life, her whole future, balanced precariously on luck. It was maddening.

The doctor told her mother some more information, but Rose was barely listening. Eventually, he left and Jackie sat down next to her.

“When he’s discharged, the both of you should come and stay at the house with us. The doctor said he might need some physical therapy for a few weeks, and we can take care of all of that. OK?” Rose stared at the floor. “Rose, sweetheart, he’s going to be fine. Good as new, once his leg heals. That’s what that doctor said, good as new.”

“Do you know what I was thinking while we rode in the ambulance?”

Jackie put an arm around her. “What’s that, Rose?”

“I was wondering, why didn’t this occur to the other Doctor? When he left us behind to have this supposedly great life together, did it never occur to him that this one might just die?”

Her mother’s eyes widened. “I don’t know.”

“And I thought, what would I do? Go back to work on the dimension cannon, hope that another pan-dimensional megalomaniac might try to destroy the universe so that I could get back to him again? I could say to him, ‘Will you take me back this time? I know you gave me the spare to play with, but I broke him.’” She felt tears spill over and roll down her cheeks. 

“Rose—”

“God, I’m just horrible. How could I think something like that?”

“Rose, you can’t blame yourself for the thoughts that cross your mind in times of stress, you just can’t.”

Rose laughed mirthlessly. “Or maybe if he didn’t want me, he could make me a new one. ‘Any other spare body parts in jars? Because I’d really prefer a version of you that will shag me and fill me with babies.’”

“Babies?”

“Someday,” Rose said, waving vaguely.

“Sweetheart, he’s going to be fine. He’ll be in recovery in another hour, and you can go in and see him.”

Rose put her head on her mother’s shoulder, finally letting sobs overtake her.


	10. Chapter 10

He was still unconscious from the anaesthesia when they let her in to see him. There was a fresh cast on one leg that started just below his knee and a wide bandage on his forehead, but he looked good otherwise, peaceful. His chest rose and fell steadily and Rose felt tears prickling her eyes again at the sight of it. Her heart seemed to clench inside her chest, and she realized once again how fiercely she loved him. She pulled a chair up to his bedside and sat, content to watch him breathe.

“Ow.” When the quiet rasp of his voice came, she was startled from a dark reverie of what-ifs. 

Quickly she grabbed his hand. “Doctor? It’s Rose, I’m here.”

“That’s good. Good, Rose is here.” He looked up at the ceiling, then his eyes closed again. “Where’s here? My head feels funny.”

“We’re in the hospital. You got hit by a car. Your leg is broken, but you’re going to be fine.”

“Am I? I don’t feel fine. Feel all … floaty. Am I drunk?” He blinked several times, then looked not quite at her.

“I’m sure it’s just the anaesthesia,” she said, squeezing his hand.

“That makes sense,” he said. “I’m going to go back to sleep, I think.”

“Okay. I’ll be here when you wake up, I promise,” she whispered. Keeping her hand in his, Rose rested her head on the bed next to him.

The next thing she knew was the feel of a hand brushing gently over her hair. Jerking upright, she realized that she had drifted off to sleep at the Doctor’s bedside. He was smiling at her, looking much more alert than the last time. “Hi,” she breathed.

“Hi, yourself. Hit by a car?” Rose was surprised that he seemed to be picking up the thread of their brief conversation from before, when he had been barely coherent. His voice sounded raspy, so she reached for a cup of water and handed it to him, watching him drink.

“Yeah. A reckless driver, going way too fast, and you weren’t paying attention, getting out of the car … do you remember?”

He frowned. “Not the actual impact, no. I remember you screaming, I think. Being put on a stretcher, my leg hurting …” He looked down at the cast and wrapped on it with his knuckles. “Used to be, I could go into a restorative trance and my bones would knit in a matter of hours. This is going to be annoying.” The Doctor shrugged and smiled at her. “Still, I’m part Time Lord, maybe I’ll heal fast.”

“You’re taking it all very well,” Rose commented. She felt unaccountably prickly, and she stood up from her chair to pace the room.

“Well, nothing I can do about it now, is there? At least everything’s fine up in the old noggin,” he said, knocking on the top of his head. 

“You have to be careful,” Rose said. “You can’t just … you have to be careful.”

“Aw, you know me, Rose, I’m always careful. Well, when I say _always_ … but you can’t blame me for this; like you said, reckless driver. Sometimes things just happen.” 

“Exactly! Things just happen, and you could’ve died!” Her voice rose to a shout.

“Wait,” he said, scratching the back of his neck. “Are you _angry_ with me?”

“No! Yes … I don’t know. You could’ve died,” she repeated.

“I know.”

“You don’t regenerate!”

“I _know_.”

“Well, what would happen to me then?”

He blinked at her. “Rose, come here and sit down,” he said, patting the bed. She looked at him and deflated, sitting where he directed. “I’m sorry I got hurt.”

“Don’t, it’s not your fault. I’m being insane, I know it.” She took his hand and clutched it tightly. “I’m terrified of losing you.”

“You didn't lose me,” he said.

“I could, at any minute. It's all just … luck.”

He sighed. “That's life. It was bad luck that the lever slipped and you fell. It was good luck that Pete caught you and you didn't fall into the Void. It's always been random chance, Rose. It is for everyone, everyday.”

She leaned over and hugged him awkwardly, feeling the familiar sting of tears.

“A bit too much like our reunion, wasn't it?” he said into her hair. “Me lying in the street. We're making a habit of that.”

“It reminded me of my dad. My first dad.” She let go of a hiccuping little sob against her will. He was the one who was hurt, and she desperately wanted to be able to be the strong one.

“Oh, Rose. I'm sorry, I didn't think of that.”

Pulling away from him, she wiped her eyes and forced a smile onto her face. “It's okay, really. We should be focusing on getting you all healed up.”

The Doctor looked down at his leg cast again. “This is going to interfere with our sex life, isn’t it?”

“Somewhat,” Rose said, smirking, “although I can think of a few things we'll be able to do with you lying on your back.” She leaned over and hugged him again. “I love you. Please don’t die before I do.”

He snorted. “How about we die simultaneously when we are very, very old?”

“It’s a deal.” Rose kissed his dry lips.

His resulting grin lit up the room, then just as suddenly his face turned serious. “Rose, I have a very important question to ask you.”

“What?”

“Does this hospital have a little shop?”

 

***

 

The Doctor hobbled around the room on his crutches impatiently. He was finally going to be discharged, as soon as the hospital sorted out the bloody paperwork. Rose was coming to pick him up but she hadn't arrived yet, another fact that was making him irritable. It had been easy to be blasé about his injuries when he had first come out of sedation, but as the days were starting to wear on he was getting more and more frustrated with his partly-human body. It was frail, and sometimes he hated it.

“Sorry to keep you waiting, Dr. Smith, it’s completely mad around here,” came a woman’s voice. The Doctor turned awkwardly on his crutches. That voice, it couldn’t be … He locked eyes with her, all fiery red hair and green eyes. 

“Donna.”

“That’s what it says on my name tag, although you wouldn’t know it, the people calling me ‘hey, you’ today.” She shuffled the papers in her hands and laid them out on the room’s only table. “Got several forms here for you to sign, then you’re one step closer to being a free man.”

“Are you a … a nurse?” he asked, feeling sweaty and wrong-footed. He collapsed into a chair, unable to take his eyes off of her.

“Ha! No, just temping as an admin, so they’ve got me running around getting people to sign forms and such. You know how it is.”

“Do I?” he asked, his voice high.

“You know, cause you’re a doctor,” she said. “Anyway, I need you to sign here and here…” She pointed out all the places he needed to sign, and initial, and sign again, so he put on his glasses and then scrawled illegibly everywhere she indicated. 

“You like it? Temping?” he asked, glancing at her as he finished the last page.

She snorted. “Who likes it? The pay’s terrible, but it’s better than being on the dole.”

“Ah.”

“What about you? You like being a doctor?”

“Oh, I’m not, not in the way you mean. Well, I know a lot about medicine, but … I mean, I’m more of a researcher.” 

“What, you’re a scientist? Well, you certainly look the part,” she said, pointing to his specs. He whipped them off and put them away, feeling insecure. Donna never had been one to make him feel good about his appearance. He almost missed it.

She picked up the papers and wrapped them smartly on the table to stack them. “Well, I’ll be off—-”

“Are you a fast typist, Donna?” he asked suddenly.

“Me?” She grinned. “Hundred words a minute, fastest temp in Chiswick.” It made his heart ache.

“Because I’ve been looking for a personal assistant. I’ve got this new position, only been there a couple of months, and I don’t have the patience for all that paperwork and email and nonsense. What I could use,” he said, smiling at her in that way he thought women liked, “is my very own personal assistant.”

Donna looked him up and down. “If this is your way of trying to pull me, I’m not having it, chicken legs,” she said.

“ _What?_ I’m not trying to … I have a girlfriend," he replied archly. "And if this is the way you respond when someone offers you a job, no wonder you’re a temp.”

“Why me? You don’t even know me,” she said, still suspicious.

“I don’t know. I just have a good feeling about you.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a card. “Call me to set up an interview. It’s a bit high security, this place, so they’ll require a background check, but I assure you, it will pay quite well.”

Donna reached out and took the card, examining it closely. Torchwood employees didn’t have cards that proclaimed who they worked for, so it held the name of a dummy corporation. “Technology Consultant? Sounds posh.” The Doctor shrugged. “All right, I’ll call you. What’s the harm?”

 

*** 

 

“You're going to have to get Dad's approval to hire a personal assistant,” Rose said as she climbed into bed next to him.

“Aww, Pete won't mind, he loves me.” The Doctor leaned over and switched off the lamp. “Well, he likes me quite a lot. Well, he tolerates me and thinks I'm a bit clever and manages not to threaten me bodily for shagging his daughter.”

“I think it helps that he's only known me as a grown woman, otherwise you probably would be in danger because of that, yeah.” She snuggled into his side. “It's good to have you home.”

“Except, we aren't home, are we, we're at your mother's.” They were staying at the mansion during his convalescence, something that Jackie had refused to compromise on. It did mean that Rose didn't have to worry about fetching and carrying for him, for which she was grateful.

“Not the first time you've recuperated at my mother's. I seem to remember a certain Christmas…”

“I suppose that's true.”

“What was she like, this Donna?” Rose asked.

“Very familiar.” He frowned in the darkness. “Do you think I made a mistake, asking her to work for me? Working for Torchwood isn't the safest thing in the world.”

“I think,” Rose said, leaning up and kissing his cheek, "that danger can come from anywhere. And besides, I think she'll just figure out what I already know.”

“What's that?”

“That the Doctor is worth the monsters.”


	11. Chapter 11

“He’s an alien.”

Rose fidgeted in her seat at the outdoor café, unwrapping her sandwich to buy some time. “Not entirely. So he told you that already, did he?” she asked Donna. It was still only two weeks since Donna had accepted the job at Torchwood.

“Already? I'd have preferred he told me at the outset, so that I could have him sectioned.”

“Donna, I think you’ve seen enough of Torchwood by now to know he’s not mad,” Rose responded. “Well, when I say not mad, I mean he's not mad on this particular point,” she said, laughing. Donna’s expression quashed her fit of giggles quickly.

“And you’re from a parallel world.”

“Yes.”

“Well, that’s just barmy, that is. How’d you end up here?” Donna took a huge bite of her sandwich, and Rose figured that she must not be too disturbed, if it wasn't interfering with her appetite.

“That is a really, really long story. Did he tell you … how much did he tell you?”

“Not much. That you and he are from a parallel world or whatever, and that he’s part … what did he call it? Time Lord. What’s a Time Lord?”

As well as Rose knew him, she still didn’t have a good answer to that question. “The important thing is that he’s a good man. He cares about people, and he’s kind, and—”

“I know all that, you don't have to sell him to me. What, did you think I was going to quit because of this?”

“Well, the thought had crossed my mind.”

“Not with the money I'm getting at this job! You’d have to drag me out kicking and screaming, you would. I'm just trying to understand, is all. Like for example, is that the reason …? Sometimes he seems to know what I’m going to say before I say it. Or we say something at exactly the same time, like we’re sharing a brain or something. Is that because he’s part Time Lord?”

 _No, it’s because he’s part you._ “Something like that.”

“I mean, I have to say, we get along well most of the time, even if he is just about the strangest man I’ve ever met.” She took another bite. “And _you_!” she said, her words somewhat garbled. “You live together, right?”

“Right.”

“What’s _that_ like?”

Rose’s eyes widened. She wasn’t sure what Donna was asking. “Um, it’s good. We’re shopping for houses right now. I think something with a garden would be nice. I always wanted a garden, growing up.”

“What are you on about, you’re a Tyler! You must have had a garden. Lots of gardens.”

“Not … it was different, in the other world. My dad died when I was a baby, and we didn’t have money. I grew up on a council estate.”

“ _Really_. No wonder you never struck me as the rich type. You can tell, people who grew up with money. But if you’re buying a house with him, it must be serious.”

Sometimes following the jumps in Donna’s conversation was as hard as following the Doctor. “We are serious.”

“Are there wedding bells, then?”

Rose blushed. “I don’t … he’s not really … I don’t really need all of that nonsense. He’s committed to me, of that I have no doubt.”

Donna snorted at her. “Wish I had a nickel for every one of my friends who thought that. Not that I’m saying he strikes me as the philandering type. Still, best to put a ring on his finger if you can.”

Rose tried to envision it: a big wedding, probably organized by her mother, and the Doctor, standing up in front of all of those people, forced to say, _I, John Smith, take thee …_ No, it just wouldn’t do. “Maybe we’ll elope.” Rose took a bite of her own sandwich and chewed. “He wants children.”

“Alien babies! You'd be willing to have _alien babies!_ ”

“They wouldn’t be … he’s part human. And genetically, our children would be human, he said. Maybe a little smarter than most, but that’s not a bad thing.”

“Well, better you than me. I like him well enough, but I don't really see what you see in him, you know. _That way._ ”

“What you do mean? He’s handsome,” Rose defended.

“I suppose he’s all right. He’s got nice hair, and the freckles are cute. He’s a bit skinny though.”

Rose giggled. “Okay, I'll grant you that. But it works for him, trust me.” Finishing her sandwich, Rose balled up the paper wrapper. “Thank you for lunch, Donna. We should do this more often.”

“We should! It was fun, and you’re not nearly as odd as I thought you’d be.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Rose said, laughing.

 

***

 

Rose gasped, trying to regain her equilibrium. “That … that was … guh.” She pressed a hand to her chest, feeling her heart racing underneath her ribs. Her ears were ringing a bit from the scream she had just let go of.

The Doctor crawled up her body, smirking and radiating self-satisfaction. “Enjoyed that, did you?” He wiped his mouth with one hand and stretched out next to her on the bed.

“Mmm. I'm enjoying having you all better,” she said, stroking her foot along his previously-broken leg, finally with no cast or brace.

“Me too.” He nuzzled her cheek with his nose and then nipped at her lips with his own, teasing.

“No more accidents, right?”

“Wish I could promise that, but I can’t, of course.”

Rose snuggled close to him. “I know.”

He sighed. “I wish …” He stopped and stroked her arm. “I wish there was a way of getting in touch with the other Doctor if something _did_ happen to me,” he said.

Rose started in shock. It was a thought she herself had had more than once. She was surprised to hear him say the same thing. “I couldn’t replace you with him, you know.”

“You sort of could, actually,” he said.

She shook her head. “He wouldn’t be with me the way you are.”

He chuckled. “He may have control over his sex drive, but he isn’t a monk.”

“I don’t mean sexually,” Rose said, propping herself up on an elbow. “I mean he would never share himself with me the way you have. Never so completely.”

“No.” He didn’t try to deny it. They held each other in silence for several minutes. “But you would have that life on the TARDIS again.”

“You know that’s not as important to me as what I have with you.”

He kissed her forehead. “I _do_ know.” He sounded like he really meant it, and Rose realized what a big step that was.

“Do you ever wonder what things would have been like if he’d let us both stay with him?” she asked. She had thought of it often in the first few weeks, wondering if the other Doctor had even considered it.

“Sometimes. Of course, I’m not sure if we could have tolerated each other, long term. And what would you have done, slept with us both?”

Rose laughed. “Don’t think the thought never crossed my mind.”

His eyes boggled a little at that. “Really?”

“Don’t look at me like that. If there were two of me, are you telling me you wouldn’t imagine what it would be like to have sex with us both?” His eyes glazed over and he tilted his head slightly to one side. “Are you imagining it now?”

“Shh,” he said. “Give me another minute.”

Rose smacked his arm. “Stop it.”

He pulled a look of chagrin, which she took to be false, over his face. “Sorry.”

She smiled in spite of herself. “In your fantasy, were the two Roses snogging? Because in mine—”

“This sounds like something that I perhaps don’t want to know.” He shuddered, then eyed her sidelong. “Just snogging?”

Rose smirked. “There might have been some oral sex.”

“Blimey.” He ran a hand through his hair. “Was I the one on the receiving end, or—no, don’t answer that.” 

She leaned over and kissed him thoroughly instead. “I suppose,” Rose said, inching down the Doctor’s body, “that in his absence, I can be persuaded to take on the task.”

“Well,” he said, and then gasped when he felt her lips on him, “that works out quite nicely then.”

 

*** 

 

It was two months later when he stepped out into their new back garden for the first time at night, escaping the stacks of boxes that he had promised to continue unpacking after Rose went to bed. The air was cold, and he pulled his long, brown coat more tightly around himself. He smiled; Rose had apparently spent an entire afternoon trolling the internet for a coat as close to his old one as she could find, and she had surprised him with it a few days ago, just in time for the first hint that winter was coming.

He let his head fall back and he looked at the stars. Most of them weren’t visible, this close to London, but he took comfort in the ones that he could see. 

It was curious, the contentment he felt, living in a house that he owned (in part, anyway), working at a somewhat regular, if rather unusual, job. He wasn’t content every day, but he was content more often than not. He still sometimes looked at Rose, sitting across the table from him or sleeping next to him in bed, and he couldn’t believe his good fortune. 

The door opened and closed behind him. “Thought you were sleeping,” he said without turning.

“Strange bedroom. I couldn’t fall asleep right away.” Rose wrapped her arms around his waist and rested her head against his back. “I thought you were unpacking the kitchen.”

“I’m shirking.” He turned in her arms and hugged her back. Rose slipped her arms under his coat, shivering slightly. “It’s a little cold to be out here in your jim jams, Rose.”

“It’s warm under your coat,” she said, burrowing against his chest.

The Doctor tilted her chin up and kissed her gently. “Perhaps I should join you upstairs, and we can christen our new bedroom properly.”

“Hmm. That sounds like a fine idea,” she said, but made no move to go inside. She looked out at the dark garden. “It’s nice out here at night.”

“It is. I think you and I can expect many evenings out here, over the years, looking up at the stars.”

“Do you think you’ll be happy here, Doctor? In the back garden, with me, looking up at the stars?”

He grinned at her. “I think,” he said, kissing her lips again, “as long as it’s the Doctor, with Rose Tyler, that I’ll be happy wherever we are.”

After another kiss, they walked back inside the house, arm in arm.

_END_


End file.
